Sifrei, exegetical midrash on Bamidbar and Devarim. Venice: Daniel Bomberg by Cornelio Adelkind, [1545]. First edition.

Fine copy, with early leather binding.

Colophon on last leaf: "The Mechilta, Sifra and Sifrei are completed… proofread and typeset by Cornelio Adelkind".

Signature on title page (in square letters): "Shlomo of Dubno".

R. Shlomo of Dubno (1739-1813), disciple of R. Shlomo of Chełm, the Mirkevet HaMishneh. Published many books, both his own and those of others. Renowned as an expert on the Biblical text, Masorah and grammar, he was asked by the Vilna Gaon to clarify the accurate Masorah of the Books of Neviim and Ketuvim – see the account by R. Pesach Finfer of Vilna (article in Beit Vaad LaChachamim, Leeds, 1902, and in his Masoret HaTorah VehaNeviim, Vilna, 1906). He was an editor of Moses Mendelssohn's commentary to Bereshit, but eventually stopped working for Mendelssohn and decided to publish Chumashim himself, which received approbations from leading rabbis of the generation (R. Shmuel Rabbi of Vilna, R. Chaim of Volozhin and R. Zelmele of Volozhin, disciples of the Vilna Gaon; as well as rabbis from Vilna, Shklow, Slutsk, the Brody Kloiz, Lviv, Berlin, Frankfurt and elsewhere). See the list of his subscribers published by R. David Kamenetzky in Yeshurun VIII-X.

Censorship expurgations.

Handwritten glosses on p. 61b.